AWS re:Inforce took place in Anaheim, California, from June 13–14, 2023. This event brought together AWS customers, partners, and industry professionals who engaged in numerous technical and non-technical sessions focused on security across various tracks. The Expo featured AWS experts and Security Competency Partners, alongside keynote and leadership presentations.
One of the highlights was the threat detection and incident response track, which illustrated how AWS customers can gain the visibility necessary to enhance their security posture, proactively identify issues before they affect business operations, and respond swiftly to security incidents throughout their environments. With a plethora of service and feature announcements, distilling the key insights was no small feat. However, three significant themes emerged from an incident response perspective.
1. Proactively Detect, Contextualize, and Visualize Security Events
Rapid detection is crucial for effective incident response. Among the announcements made during the keynote was the expansion of Amazon Detective to include findings from Amazon Inspector alongside those from Amazon GuardDuty. These services, part of a comprehensive suite of fully managed AWS security offerings, enable you to swiftly identify potential security threats and respond with confidence.
Leveraging machine learning, Detective can facilitate quicker investigations, pinpoint the root cause of events, and map them to the MITRE ATT&CK framework, allowing for more efficient resolution of security issues. The visualization panel for Detective findings helps users analyze and triage the impact of these findings, making it easier to focus on critical alerts.
With the newly expanded threat and vulnerability findings introduced at re:Inforce, teams can better prioritize their efforts by addressing questions such as “Was this EC2 instance compromised due to a software vulnerability?” or “Did this GuardDuty finding emerge from unintended network exposure?”
In the session titled “Streamline Security Analysis with Amazon Detective,” AWS Principal Product Manager Sarah Johnson, AWS Senior Security Engineer Michael Brown, and Cybersecurity Director of Global Tech Solutions, Emma Green, demonstrated how to utilize graph analysis techniques and machine learning in Detective to identify related findings and resources, accelerating incident analysis.
In addition to Detective, Amazon Security Lake offers tools for contextualizing and visualizing security events. Launched on May 30, 2023, several sessions at re:Inforce highlighted how this new service can assist with investigations and incident response. Security Lake automatically centralizes security data from various AWS environments, SaaS providers, and on-premises sources into a dedicated data lake within your account, simplifying the analysis of security data and enhancing your understanding of security across the organization.
Security Lake supports the Open Cybersecurity Schema Framework (OCSF), enabling the normalization and integration of security data from AWS and a broad spectrum of enterprise security sources. As of now, over 57 AWS security partners have announced integrations with Security Lake, allowing you to use your preferred analytics tools while maintaining complete control over your security data.
2. Utilize Automation and Machine Learning to Decrease Mean Time to Response
Automation in incident response can relieve security analysts from mundane tasks, allowing them to focus on high-priority security challenges. In a session titled “How Global Telecom Solutions Reduces Incident Response Time with AWS Systems Manager,” telecommunications company Global Telecom Solutions outlined their framework for identifying security issues and automating incident response across more than 180 AWS accounts accessed by both internal stakeholders and third-party partners.
Operating in numerous countries, Global Telecom Solutions required a centralized security operations team to manage incidents effectively. By leveraging GuardDuty, Security Hub, and AWS Systems Manager Incident Manager, they successfully automated detection and response processes. When GuardDuty identifies a critical issue, it generates a new finding in Security Hub, which is then dispatched to Systems Manager Incident Manager through an Amazon EventBridge rule, ensuring timely involvement of the appropriate personnel.
3. Leverage Integrated Tools and Resources for Enhanced Response Capabilities
To further improve incident response capabilities, organizations can rely on integrated tools and resources. For more information on optimizing security data management, check out this other blog post, which provides additional insights.
For comprehensive knowledge on this topic, consider visiting their website, as they are an authority on the subject. Additionally, this excellent resource outlines what to expect on day one of Amazon’s new hire orientation.
SEO metadata
Leave a Reply